Dennis Prager Show - The End of Beauty and Excellence
Aired: 2021-08-03
Duration: 08:05


=== Why Orchestras Are Dying (06:38) ===

[00:00:00]  Now, you had strongly advocated it to me, living murder.
[00:00:06]  The great Heather MacDonald wrote a piece about what's happening to orchestras and music, in general classical music.
[00:00:15]  The people in charge of classical music in this country, heads of orchestras and opera houses, are destroying classical music in this country.
[00:00:26]  There was one statistic.
[00:00:28]  Which I forgot to print out.
[00:00:32]  But I could see if you could find it.
[00:00:34]  It's very easy to find it in her article.
[00:00:38]  The percentage of high schools that had orchestras in 1960, I think it was.
[00:00:46]  Obviously, don't look up the word orchestra.
[00:00:49]  Because every paragraph has the word.
[00:00:52]  But high school, I think that would do it.
[00:00:55]  It went from...
[00:00:57]  Over 60% to something like 17%.
[00:01:01]  Oh, I was good.
[00:01:06]  67 to 17. What did I say?
[00:01:09]  I think I said something almost exactly that.
[00:01:11]  67, I don't usually remember these things well, but I'm better at numbers than I am at names.
[00:01:17]  67% of high schools, what year was that?
[00:01:21]  That's what I want to know.
[00:01:23]  Okay, so that's between 1962 and 1989. I'm sure it's fewer today.
[00:01:29]  67 to 17%.
[00:01:31]  It's, it really is, it's tears inducing.
[00:01:41]  You know, what beautiful things created by humanity are given to young people today?
[00:01:51]  None.
[00:01:52]  Do you understand that?
[00:01:53]  Here is the way life is supposed to work.
[00:02:00]  Every generation is supposed to teach its next generation the best that has been done anywhere in the world.
[00:02:11]  That's it.
[00:02:12]  That is their task.
[00:02:14]  Here is the best literature.
[00:02:16]  Here is the best music.
[00:02:18]  Here is the best art.
[00:02:20]  Here is the best sculpture.
[00:02:24]  Here is the greatest wisdom.
[00:02:27]  That was what was believed.
[00:02:29]  That's why people studied the ancients.
[00:02:31]  Not because they were ancient, but because they have withstood the greatest test of all time.
[00:02:39]  The word timeless was attached to them.
[00:02:41]  Timeless wisdom.
[00:02:46]  Even if your child goes to a 40,000...
[00:02:50]  Well, not even.
[00:02:51]  If your child goes to a $40,000 a year high school, has your child studied the greatest artworks, the greatest music works, the greatest literature?
[00:03:02]  Has your child studied that?
[00:03:05]  Do you understand what the reduction of the production of these things to race is about?
[00:03:11]  Aside from being the purest form of racism, it is the end of beauty.
[00:03:17]  It is the end of excellence.
[00:03:19]  The end of depth.
[00:03:24]  It's only a destructive idea.
[00:03:29]  All these orchestras and opera companies saying they're racist because there are so few blacks in an orchestra, for example.
[00:03:40]  Well, how do orchestras get members?
[00:03:43]  From the conservatories.
[00:03:46]  Music conservatories.
[00:03:47]  You know how long you have to study an instrument to be proficient enough to be in an orchestra?
[00:03:52]  The overwhelming majority, you know, I conduct orchestras, so I've interviewed musicians often.
[00:03:59]  When did you start?
[00:04:01]  When I was six.
[00:04:02]  When did you start?
[00:04:03]  When I was five.
[00:04:08]  It's theoretically possible to start violin at 15 and be good enough to be in an orchestra.
[00:04:14]  It almost never happens.
[00:04:17]  Are black kids studying violin at 5?
[00:04:20]  And is the reason they're not because of racism?
[00:04:23]  Who's preventing black kids from studying violin?
[00:04:26]  The answer is, it's not being given to them by most of their parents.
[00:04:31]  That's it.
[00:04:32]  This is not complex.
[00:04:33]  Asian kids are getting it.
[00:04:37]  A generation and two ago, orchestras were disproportionately composed of Jews.
[00:04:43]  Now they're disproportionately composed of Asians.
[00:04:48]  Why?
[00:04:49]  Jews were not persecuted?
[00:04:53]  But it was a very important thing.
[00:04:55]  It's not, by the way, it shows the decline in Jewish life.
[00:04:58]  How many kids in Jewish families are given an instrument to play at five or six or seven?
[00:05:09]  Okay.
[00:05:10]  So Asian kids, yes.
[00:05:14]  You know who's going to save classical music?
[00:05:16]  Just like Western civilization may be saved by Eastern Europe, Christianity may be saved by Africa, and classical music may be saved by Asia.
[00:05:27]  The Chinese, the Koreans, and the Japanese.
[00:05:34]  They produce so many spectacular musicians and so many listeners, which is the most important.
[00:05:45]  The idea that the New York Philharmonic is racist?
[00:05:51]  Well, it is racist.
[00:05:52]  It's become racist.
[00:05:53]  That's the irony, because now it thinks in terms of race.
[00:05:56]  But the reason there are so few blacks at the New York Philharmonic...
[00:06:02]  It's not because of racism.
[00:06:07]  Anthony Tomasini of the New York Times has actually advocated, he's the chief music critic, that they stop blind auditions.
[00:06:15]  Blind auditions were started in order not to be racist.
[00:06:19]  To give you an idea how truly sick, I can't think of a more accurate word the left is, they want to undo Blind auditions.

=== She Came to Listen (01:42) ===

[00:06:28]  Blind auditions mean you play behind a curtain.
[00:06:31]  They don't know your race.
[00:06:32]  They don't know your sex.
[00:06:34]  They don't know if they know you.
[00:06:36]  Whether you're a friend.
[00:06:40]  All they know is the sounds of your instrument.
[00:06:46]  And the left is against that.
[00:06:53]  Yep.
[00:06:57]  What a piece she wrote.
[00:07:00]  She loves music like I do.
[00:07:03]  Or if you will, I love music like she does.
[00:07:05]  She even came out to the concert that I conducted.
[00:07:10]  She came out to L.A. to watch me conduct the Haydn Symphony.
[00:07:16]  I hope that's released one day.
[00:07:17]  It was videoed.
[00:07:19]  But I think there were union rules or something.
[00:07:26]  I would pay.
[00:07:28]  I think people would get a big charge out of it and it might get people interested in classical music.
[00:07:34]  What beauty is given to children today?
[00:07:36]  Think about it.
[00:07:37]  What beauty?
[00:07:39]  What excellence?
[00:07:44]  That's our task.
[00:07:46]  It is not our task to come up with new unless it's better.
[00:07:50]  If there's something new that's great, I'm all for it.
[00:07:54]  I think there was great music written in the 20th century.
[00:07:58]  Fine.
[00:08:00]  But it's gotta be great.
[00:08:03]  And greatness is not determined by race.